Clean Water at Every Visit: A Look Behind the Scenes
When you sit down in one of our chairs, the water that rinses your mouth and cools our instruments is ordinary, and we intend to keep it that way. Like a lot of what makes a dental visit run smoothly, that takes a routine most patients never see. Here is ours.
Why dental waterlines get a routine of their own
Dental chairs deliver water through slim tubing, and like any plumbing, slim tubing stays clean when it is maintained and checked on a schedule. Because of that, there are national standards for the water used in dental treatment, and a well-run office follows them the same way it follows sterilization routines for instruments. It is simply part of running a clean practice.
The standard we work to
The CDC’s guidelines for dentistry say the water used in routine dental treatment should meet the same standard the EPA sets for drinking water, no more than 500 colony-forming units per milliliter (≤500 CFU/mL) of heterotrophic bacteria. Colorado holds dental offices to those CDC guidelines: the Colorado Dental Board’s infection control rule (Rule 1.16, 3 CCR 709-1) adopts them as part of state regulation, so following them is part of how every Colorado practice is expected to operate.
Our protocol at Precision Dental of Windsor
- Our waterlines are maintained and treated following the equipment manufacturer’s instructions
- Every line in every operatory is tested every quarter: the air/water syringe, the handpiece line, and the scaler line
- Every result is written into our waterline testing log, with the date, the operatory, and the line recorded
- If a line ever tested above the standard, we would treat that operatory’s lines and test again, following the same guidelines
- For surgical procedures, we use sterile water or saline through a separate sterile delivery system, as the guidelines call for
- Lines are also retested after any plumbing work, so a repair never goes unverified
That is the whole routine: maintain, test, log, and verify. It is one of the less visible parts of how we keep the office clean, and it happens whether or not anyone thinks to ask about it.
Comfortable and personalized dentistry includes the details you never see. Questions about your care? Call us at (970) 237-4313, and let’s talk.
My takeaway as a dentist: the details patients never see are a fair measure of a practice. Water testing is not glamorous, and it is not optional in my mind: follow the standard, test on a schedule, write it down, and keep the record. Evidence matters, and so does the routine that produces it.
New patients can read about their first visit before they come in.
Sources and further reading
- CDC, Dental Unit Water Quality: cdc.gov
- CDC, Guidelines for Infection Control in Dental Health-Care Settings, 2003 (MMWR 2003;52(RR-17)): cdc.gov
- CDC, Summary of Infection Prevention Practices in Dental Settings, 2016: cdc.gov
- Colorado Dental Board Rules and Regulations, 3 CCR 709-1, Rule 1.16 Infection Control: codha.org
- Association for Dental Safety (formerly OSAP), Dental Unit Water Quality White Paper and Recommendations, 2018: academia.edu
- American Dental Association, Guidelines for Practice Success: Do’s and Don’ts for Maintaining Dental Unit Water Lines: ada.org